Chez Panisse gives culinary students cooking lesson

Alameda students Will Jensen, left, and Julia Carvalho make pizza at Chez Panisse in Berkeley on Aug. 14. The visit was part of a weeklong summer class at the Weezie Mott Cooking School. (Janet Levaux/For Bay Area News Group)

ALAMEDA — A group of Alameda children sat down for a pizza lunch recently, enjoying themselves before heading back to school. But there was no frozen or restaurant chain food involved in the experience.

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The six kids dined at the revered and critically acclaimed Chez Panisse in Berkeley, where they learned how chef and owner Alice Waters works her magic as part of their weeklong class at the Weezie Mott Cooking School in Alameda.

General manager Jennifer Sherman took the students on a tour before they made their own pizzas on the second floor of the world-famous restaurant, which opened its doors in 1971.

“Alice Waters wanted to open a restaurant for her friends,” Sherman explained, as a nearby floral designer prepared a large display on the first floor.

“We were one of the first places in the United States to have an open kitchen,” she said, which came to life in 1982 after a large fire at the famous eatery. “It lets people in the restaurant hear the sounds and smell the smells.”

“I came here in the ’70s, when it looked so different,” said Mott, who opened her Alameda cooking school in 1977, many years after she attended the Cordon Bleu Cooking School in London.

At least one student was impressed with the restaurant’s layout.

“I liked how, after the kitchen (downstairs) caught on fire, there was an open hole, and they said, ‘Let’s keep it,’ ” said Will Jensen, a fifth-grader at Wood Middle School. “It’s so open, and you can see them cooking your food.”

Another student found the pastry operations appealing.

“I liked touring the pastry area, because I make lots of cookies and brownies,” explained Julia Carvalho, a sixth-grader at Alameda Community Learning Center.

After the first-floor kitchen and pantry, the students visited the composting area and a shed where fresh tomatoes and other produce are kept.

“We keep them here because if you put them in the fridge they will lose their flavor,” said Sherman, who also described the farm-to-table process.

“You never put tomatoes in the refrigerator,” Mott emphasized to the children, who were curious about a melon stored outside as well.

Back inside, the lunch crowd was bustling upstairs and downstairs, and staff were rushing to take orders, cook meals and serve guests.

“It looks kind of stressful, but I think the people look happy too,” said Harold Huynh, a fourth-grader at Franklin Elementary.

Students took turns making pizza and delivering the food to their table after it had cooked in a wood-burning oven.

“I liked making pizza because we got to make it by ourselves and then we got to eat what we made,” said Dashiell Eckmier, a seventh-grader at the Academy of Alameda.